The Last Heroes Read online

  There was no way in the world that he would so much as pat the delightful little rear end of a nineteen-year-old college girl . . . but the thought was not uninteresting.

  His profound philosophical reverie at the wheel of the Time Out was interrupted by the appearance of Sarah Child herself. She was wearing white shorts and a sheer white blouse.

  She handed him a bottle of beer.

  ‘‘Thank you,’’ he said.

  ‘‘Why don’t you make Mr. Canidy take his turn?’’ she asked.

  ‘‘ ‘Mr. Canidy’?’’ he answered, gently mocking, aware that she thought of him and Canidy as adults and not boys. ‘‘Why, Miss Child, I will tell you the shameful truth. ‘Mr. Canidy’ confessed to me just as soon as we had let loose the lines that he had never piloted a boat like this before. Can you believe that? A naval pilot who can’t steer a boat?’’

  She chuckled ‘‘I like him,’’ she said. ‘‘Are you sure he’s telling you the truth?’’

  ‘‘I hadn’t thought about that,’’ he said. Now that he did he realized it was entirely possible that Canidy had told him that because he didn’t want to spend the afternoon at the wheel of a cabin cruiser moving slowly up a river.

  He looked at her and met her eyes, and she looked away and flushed.

  ‘‘I’ve been thinking about the riverboats,’’ she said.

  ‘‘You almost expect to see something out of Mark Twain coming around the next bend, with tall smokestacks and a paddlewheel.’’

  ‘‘All there is on the river these days,’’ he said, ‘‘are diesel tugboats. They push barges of coal downstream, and gasoline up.’’

  ‘‘Pity,’’ she said. She had an adorable expression as she said that.

  ‘‘Yes, it is,’’ he agreed.

  Davey Bershin came up the ladder to the flying bridge a moment later, to ask Sarah Child if she wanted to play cards, and she went with him.

  Ed Bitter was sorry to see her go, but realized it was probably a good thing. He had been unable to keep his eyes off her, and sooner or later she would have caught him at it.

  When they returned to The Plantation at sunset, Dick Canidy spent the evening talking flying with Brandon Chambers, while the others played noisily at Monopoly in the game room. Ed Bitter sat quietly with them, not playing, drinking more than he knew he should, unable to keep his eyes off Sarah Child at the Monopoly board.

  When the game was finally over, Ann Chambers got the phonograph going again and walked over to them. She stood there until her father noticed her.

  ‘‘You need something, honey?’’ he asked.

  ‘‘No, I’m just standing here with a sad look on my face, waiting to be asked to dance.’’

  ‘‘You dance with her, Dick,’’ Mr. Chambers said. ‘‘I’m old, fat, and tired, and I’m about to go to bed.’’

  Canidy got up. ‘‘I’ll dance with her,’’ he said. ‘‘And then because I’m young and tired, I’m going to bed.’’

  What the hell, Ed Bitter thought and went over to Sarah. She stood up and walked to him, as if she had known he would come to her. Her eyes met his, and then she averted them, flushed, and then looked at him again. There was something electric about the look, he thought.

  When he put his hands on hers, it was warm, and thirty seconds after he had her in his arms, he actually started to tremble. He could feel the warmth of her belly against him.

  When the record was over, he turned her over to Davey Bershin and went to the bar and drank a straight shot of Scotch to see if that wouldn’t calm him down—knowing that drinking was the worst thing he could be doing. The next-worst thing was staying in the room with Sarah, especially since Canidy had made good on his promise to go to bed. Sue-Ellen was gone now too. He had no business here with these kids.

  There was a flash of lightning and a moment later a clap of thunder, and he remembered that the convertible was sitting in front of the house with the roof down. After he put the top up, he would go to bed.

  He went out the screen door behind the bar to avoid walking through the playroom, then went around the side of the house to the car. He got the boot off and into the trunk and got in the car and started the engine. He had just leaned across the seat to latch the fastener when Sarah Child appeared at the window.

  Their eyes met, and this time, although she flushed, she didn’t look away.

  ‘‘Going for a ride?’’ she asked. Her voice was artificial, as if she were having difficulty controlling it.

  ‘‘I was just putting the top up,’’ he replied, in a tone as artificial as hers. He could feel his heart beating. ‘‘Would you like to go for a ride?’’

  She got in the car and closed the door.

  He drove down the dirt road to the airstrip. Neither of them said a word until he had stopped beside the stagger-wing Beech.

  He looked at her, and saw that she was looking at him. He reached his hand out and ran the knuckles against her cheek.

  "Jesus!" he said.

  She smiled and caught his hand in hers. He had never seen eyes brighter than hers were now.

  ‘‘Jesus,’’ she said, mocking him.

  ‘‘I’m trembling,’’ he said.

  ‘‘Me, too,’’ she said. She reached up and turned the ignition key off, and then pushed the armrest between the seats up out of the way and slid over to him.

  He held her tightly against him, his face in her hair, aware of her breasts against his chest. It seemed to be a very long time before he kissed her, first on the hair, and then on the forehead, and only at long last on her mouth. When he kissed her on the mouth, her mouth was open under his, and he found her tongue, which was at the same time gently moving against his. Then she unbuttoned her blouse and slipped it off, and then her bra. And in a few seconds more, she was naked. In a few more seconds, so was Ed Bitter.

  Later he drove her back to The Lodge. When they were almost to the road at the front of the house, she said: ‘‘Let me out here, and I’ll walk. Then nobody will know we’ve been off together.’’

  He stopped the car and she got out. He watched her as she walked toward the house, staying in the shadows of the trees. When she finally appeared on the veranda, he put the Buick in gear and drove to the barn and parked the car. He turned the engine off and sat there for a couple of minutes, trying to put together what was happening; and then he got out of the car and walked out of the barn toward the river. It was pleasant to sit there at night in the dark and the quiet and watch the river flow by, as it had for—what, a million years, two million?

  He sat down on the bank and glanced at the boat. Some damned fool had left a light on in one of the cabins. The master cabin. He forgot whether or not he had plugged in the shore power line when they’d tied up that afternoon. If the shore power line was not connected, the lights would drain the battery.

  The Time Out was docked with her bow downstream. The shore power connection was aft, just inside the cockpit. The stairs to the wharf put him on the wharf by the Time Out’s bow. As he walked past the ports of the master cabin, he thought he saw movement inside. The first thing he thought was that a thief had boarded her. He moved as quickly and quietly as he could to the porthole. The curtain had been drawn, but not completely. There was enough of a crack for him to see inside.

  He didn’t believe what he saw at first. It was the most shocking thing he had ever seen in his life.

  Dick Canidy and Sue-Ellen Chambers were in the master bed, naked as jaybirds, Sue-Ellen on top, straddling Canidy, playing with her breasts as she moved up and down on him. The look on her face was absolutely wanton.

  In turmoil—angry and confused—he went back up the stairs onto the lawn, and then up the lawn to the house. There were lights over the veranda, and the foyer lights were on, but the playroom was dark. Everybody else had apparently gone to bed.

  He looked at his watch. It was quarter past twelve. Had he been gone that long with Sarah? Time seemed to have simply vanished.

  He entere
d the playroom the way he had left it, by the screen door to its rear. There was a light switch by the door, but he remembered another light switch under the bar. Ed went over and turned it on, picked up a bottle of whiskey and a few ice cubes, and made himself a stiff drink. He took a large swallow and put the glass down. Supporting himself with both hands on the bar, he bent his head over between them.

  What to do about Sue-Ellen and that goddamned Canidy?

  His cousin’s wife was a whore and an unfaithful wife and a sexual degenerate, and his ‘‘friend’’ was faithless. A gentleman would not dishonor . . .

  ‘‘Is it that much of a problem for you?’’ Sarah Child asked.

  ‘‘What are you doing here?’’

  ‘‘I watched out the window,’’ Sarah said. ‘‘Until I saw you come back from the river.’’

  ‘‘Oh,’’ he said. Sarah was wearing a bathrobe. He sensed from her movement that she wasn’t wearing much under it.

  ‘‘If you’re worrying about me, don’t,’’ Sarah said. ‘‘You’re not obligated to me.’’

  ‘‘To tell the truth,’’ he said, ‘‘I was thinking about something else.’’

  ‘‘China?’’ she asked.

  ‘‘Yes,’’ he replied. That should close that subject. He thought of what Canidy had told him about lying. Like screwing, it got easier with practice.

  ‘‘Come on,’’ he said to Sarah. ‘‘Let’s get out of here before we wake everybody up.’’

  She smiled and nodded. He turned out the light under the bar and then guided her through the darkened playroom, through the dining room into the foyer, and then up the stairs.

  He had no idea where her room was, of course, but he was surprised when she followed him down the west wing corridor. He would have thought that Aunt Jenny would have put the girls in the east wing and the boys in the west wing. He came to his door. Jesus, it would be nice to get her in there!

  An insane idea!

  ‘‘Good night, Sarah,’’ he said, and leaned over to kiss her.

  She avoided his mouth, but wrapped her arms around him. He was confused. And then, after a moment, she said:

  ‘‘Hung for a wolf as a sheep.’’

  ‘‘Jesus!’’

  She just smiled—a sweet, trusting smile.

  He opened the door and she followed him through it. He turned around and fastened the latch. He turned to face her.

  ‘‘Jesus Christ, you’re beautiful!’’

  ‘‘I’m glad you think so,’’ Sarah Child said. She met his eyes and then she pulled the cord of her bathrobe open and let it fall off her shoulders.

  That, she thought, was easier to do than I thought it would be.

  I was right, he thought, when I thought she wasn’t wearing much under the bathrobe. She had worn nothing under it.

  ‘‘Sarah, I . . .’’ he began. She shut him off.

  ‘‘Let’s not either of us say anything we might not feel like repeating in the morning,’’ Sarah said. She turned around and walked to the bed and slid under the sheets.

  FOUR

  Transient Officers’ Quarters Anacostia Naval Air Station Washington, D.C. 1645 Hours 16 June 1941

  At 0815 that morning the admiral’s aide had handed Lieutenants (j.g.) Edwin Bitter and Richard Canidy an envelope containing tickets on the Pennsylvania Railroad from Washington, D.C., to New York, and a slip of paper on which two addresses were typed:

  Commander G. H. Porter

  Special Actions Section

  BuPers Room 213 Temp. Building G-34

  CAMCO

  Suite 1745

  Rockefeller Center

  1230 Sixth Avenue

  New York, New York

  Then he drove them, in the admiral’s car, to Base Operations, where he waited to make sure nothing unforeseen would keep them from getting seats on the courier plane, an R4-D, the Navy version of the new Douglas DC-3 twin-engine airliner, which made an every-other-day round-robin flight from Washington to Key West, with stops at points of naval interest, including Pensacola, in between.

  They landed at Anacostia a little after two, checked into the transient quarters, and then took a taxi to Temporary Building G-34, one of the buildings on the mall that had been built to provide temporary office space for the Navy during World War I.

  It soon became apparent that Commander Porter knew only that higher authority had decided that Lieutenants Bitter and Canidy were to be honorably discharged for the convenience of the naval service—and as quickly as possible. Commander Porter was not aware, Canidy thought cynically, that the two of them had volunteered to sweep the Japanese from the skies over China in defense of Mom’s Apple Pie and the American Way of Life, and thus he had reasonably concluded that the reason they were being discharged—and as quickly as possible—was to spare the naval service the inconvenience of court-martialing them for having been caught with their hands in the till of the officers’ club, or in the pants of some brother officer’s wife.

  Commander Porter therefore treated them with icy courtesy, according to the book, and informed them that while the paperwork was being prepared to effect their separation, they would undergo a complete physical examination at the naval hospital. It did not matter, Commander Porter told them, that they had six weeks before been certified as physically fit for aviation duty. That was an aviation physical; this was a separation physical.

  When they went to the naval hospital, they were told that separation physicals were given at 0800 in the morning, and they should return then.

  ‘‘Look at the bright side, Eddie,’’ Canidy said as they came out of the naval hospital. ‘‘With a little bit of luck, we can get laid.’’

  ‘‘Christ, is that all you ever think about?’’ Bitter snapped.

  Something was bothering Bitter, Canidy knew. It was probably that Naval Academy graduates who wished to become admirals did not leave the Navy. Commander Porter’s icy disdain had given weight to his fears.

  ‘‘Let’s go get out of our uniforms,’’ Canidy said, ‘‘and then treat ourselves to a good dinner. And maybe a movie.’’

  Bitter gave him a weak smile.

  When they returned to the Transient Officers’ Quarters at Anacostia, a tall, handsome Army Air Corps second lieutenant was waiting for them. He was wearing a green blouse, to which were pinned silver pilot’s wings. There was a glossy Sam Browne belt. He wore pink riding breeches, and rested his glistening riding boots on the low table in front of him. His uniform cap, perched on the rear of his head, exposed light blond hair. The stiffener had been removed from the crown of the cap, and the cap itself looked as if it had been driven over by a coal truck. The crushed hat was the mark of the fighter pilot.

  The handsome young officer was Jim Whittaker, who displayed a lot of white teeth and a warm smile when he saw Canidy, but he did not get up.

  ‘‘What the hell are you doing here, Jim?’’ Canidy asked, smiling broadly. He went to him and shook his hand.

  ‘‘I came to save you from this nautical squalor,’’ the young aviator said, gesturing around the almost elegantly furnished foyer. ‘‘But the question is, what the hell are you doing here? And I don’t mean ‘why aren’t you at the house?’ ’’

  ‘‘Eddie,’’ Canidy said, ‘‘this is Jim Whittaker. Jim, Ed Bitter.’’

  Bitter smiled, but not warmly. He had, he was sure, just come across yet another Canidy, that is, someone who would embarrass him somehow within the hour.

  They shook hands.

  ‘‘Are you involved in what he’s done?’’ Whittaker asked. ‘‘Or are you his guard?’’

  ‘‘We’re together.’’ Bitter smiled uneasily.

  ‘‘How the hell did you find me here?’’ Canidy asked.

  ‘‘When I called Pensacola,’’ Whittaker said, ‘‘and got a mysterious runaround about you, I called back and led them to believe I was an aide-de-camp to an unspecified general officer who absolutely had to get in touch with you. After some hesitation, they
said you could be found here. I came straight from the airport. What the hell is going on?’’

  ‘‘We’re going to China,’’ Canidy said.

  ‘‘Dick,’’ Bitter protested.

  ‘‘China?’’ Whittaker said thoughtfully. ‘‘I don’t think you can get to China from here. I think you have to go to San Francisco and take the Southern Pacific and Yangtze River.’’

  Canidy laughed. ‘‘What are you doing here? Better late than never?’’

  ‘‘I’m sorry about that,’’ Whittaker said. ‘‘The Air Corps was being beastly to me. Does the Navy use the phrase ‘exigencies of the service’?’’

  ‘‘All the time,’’ Canidy said.

  ‘‘In the Air Corps, it means, ‘Fuck you, you’re Reserve second lieutenant, you don’t get no leave,’ ’’ Whittaker said.

  Canidy laughed.

  Ed Bitter cringed as three officers, the most senior of them a full commander, sitting at a table across the foyer glanced their way in disapproval.

  ‘‘Tell me about China,’’ Whittaker said.

  ‘‘I probably know less about China than you do,’’ Canidy said. ‘‘But I’ll have a go at it. What exactly would you like to know?’’

  ‘‘Why are you going there, wiseass?’’

  ‘‘For a discharge from the Navy, and six hundred bucks a month,’’ Canidy said.

  ‘‘The American Volunteer Group,’’ Whittaker said. ‘‘They were recruiting at Randolph Field, too.’’

  ‘‘Regular little Charley Chan, aren’t you?’’ Canidy said.

  ‘‘Chesty and Bill Donovan were in Texas, is how I found out,’’ Whittaker said. ‘‘The firm’s got the contract for expanding the place, and for satellite airfields. Anyway, they had me to dinner at the Main Club. Chesty, Donovan, the base commander, and me. My squadron now treats me with a lot more respect.’’

  Bitter laughed.

  ‘‘So I asked what the volunteering was all about, and Donovan told me.’’